Grandma racer tearing things up at the track
She was racing off-road when most of us were in diapers and she is old enough to be a grandma. In fact, they call her “grandma” at the Pahrump Valley Speedway.
Racer Jeri Patrick, at 73, is looking at being a racer for as long as she can. She’s in her third year of racing at the speedway.
“I have no physical ailments except arthritis that will take me out of racing,” Patrick said. “I was only going to race one more year, but I say that every year because I will get angry at the car. I am going to try and race until my body says I am too old. I am having fun now.”
She started racing in 1974 in off-road racing. She was in the Mint 400 in the Buggy Class in the mid-70s and finished 14th in her class. She also raced in the Laughlin 300 and the SNORE 250 to name a few others. In the SNORE 250, she finished third in her class.
She stopped off-road racing in 1979 and moved to Elko to raise her family.
It took her 35 years and a move to Pahrump to get back into the sport.
“My kids started racing when they grew up because they saw me do it,” Patrick said. “Robert Smotherman, my son, started racing and raced in the Bull Ring and up north.”
Grandma also has a daughter, Sue Smotherman, racing at the speedway, along with her granddaughter Dylan Smotherman.
“My mother got me into racing to keep me out of trouble,” Robert Smotherman said.
Patrick moved to Pahrump in 2004 and then in 2006 she started watching her son racing at the Pahrump Valley Speedway and that got her started again.
“I really missed it,” she said.
Patrick says racing is all about the fun and leaving all her troubles behind once she steps on to that track.
“I don’t get mad at anyone, if anything I get mad at myself and the car,” she said. “It’s not my personality to get mad and so I don’t change when I race, and I am just happy to be out there.”
Behind every racing grandma is a behind-the-scenes grandpa. Bryon Patrick is 100 percent behind his racing wife. He is the man that fixes things when they start acting up. He was the one that got his wife into the Coupe Class.
“I thought the Coupe Class would be easy to work on,” Bryon Patrick said. “Then Robert (Smotherman), came up and told me some prices.”
Before long, they approached racer Donny Berger, who builds coupes and made a purchase.
Bryon Patrick is no stranger to racing. In the 80s and 90s he had designed oil pumps for NASCAR race cars. He was perfectly comfortable with fixing race cars and getting them ready for the track. He is a one-man pit crew.
Once the car was completed and ready, Jeri Patrick returned to racing and she did it with the full support of family and friends.
Her son said it seemed only natural for his mother to return to racing.
“My mother was always good so I never really worried about her,” Robert Smotherman said.
But her racing dreams hit a block wall — she really hit a wall.
In 2014, her first year, she was in a dramatic collision where her car rolled three times before hitting the wall. She said the collision looked far worse than what it was.
She recalled the car rolling.
“My car clipped a racer and caused my car to roll,” she said. “As I rolled it was like being in slow motion. I heard the clink of the metal as I rolled and I said to myself that it would soon be over,” Jeri Patrick said. “I got some major bruising from that.”
Her husband was there watching it all transpire from the stands.
“I was sitting in the bleachers as she rolled the car,” he said. “I then ran to her saying to myself, oh shit. Thank God for the harness.”
Her son was also there that day.
“I was a little worried about her after the crash, but I was there, and she was OK,” Smotherman said.
The crash slowed down her racing at the speedway because the car damage amounted to around $2,500. Jeri Patrick had to wait until her husband fixed the car.
“I was basically able to fix everything but the frame,” Bryon Patrick said. “I had to send that out.”
That year she was able to get back on the track and finished in fourth place in points in her class. In fact, she also finished fourth in 2015.
This year she is third in points in the Coupe Class.
“I would be happy to come in second this year,” she said.
With the terrible crash well behind her, there really isn’t any doubt that Jeri Patrick is a sound racer.
“I would race with her any day,” Chad Broadhead, Pahrump Valley Speedway owner said. “She never caused any problems on the track.”
Her husband never doubted his wife could race.
“Well, when we first met she told me she raced off-road and I had doubted her a bit. I really thought she was full of baloney,” he said. “She then showed me her trophies and all the doubt faded.”
He really hasn’t had any doubts about her racing since.
Contact sports editor Vern Hee at vhee@pvtimes.com
